veggie tales

Excuse the overtly geometrical presentation, but this colorful platter was my dinner the other night.  Baked zucchini, tomatoes, and breaded eggplant with mozzarella over orzo pasta...

This is a big deal for several reasons. One of them being that when I was little—among a multitude of other embarrassing occurrences throughout my childhood—I literally only ate chicken fingers with ranch dressing.  At every meal I possibly could I would order fried chicken strips with a side of ranch—I even included a small blob of ranch on a plate when our elementary art project was to sculpt our favorite food.  Hidden Valley's ranch and I have had a love affair that has lasted through the ages.  

While chicken fingers and I have since grown apart and my palette has expanded immensely.  So the amount of vegetables I consumed just the other night was probably more than I had my entire life up until about age thirteen.

Other reasons for this being a big deal are just that it was so unexpectedly delish—I underestimated the scrumptious-ness of a meal without meat—and not to mention pretty!  One of my roommates is a vegetarian and this came from her cookbook, 

Zucchini Casserole:

1. Slice zucchini lengthwise into four strips and brush with oil.

2. Bake at 400F for 10 minutes.

3. Remove from oven and layer mozzarella, diced tomatoes, basil and/or oregano over it.

4. Bake for 5 more minutes.

Delightful, delicious, de-lovely—see what I did there!?